Carolyn
by paradocent
Summary: At the heights of power, the people around President Adar gather to woo the great and good. Carolyn Culverson meets Frances Innes, whom tragedy will shortly thrust into their circle.


**Carolyn**

An_ Evaded Cadence _one-shot

Simon J. Dodd

_Caprica City._

_February, 1,999 A.E.: Fourteen months before the Fall._

If it were not true that the people in the ballroom were the wealthiest in the Twelve Colonies, it would remain fair to say that they controlled the greater part of that wealth. As they went, so went the worlds. Or at least—so went the theory.

Carolyn D. Culverson, Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff, had many skills well-suited to plying the politics trade. She hoped that none of them would prove relevant to the Gala. She was here only because _all_ the important people from Cavendish House were supposed to be here. Small minds and small donors might want to meet the President, but _these _knew better:Theywanted ins with the people _around_ the President. If any skill would help her tonight, it would be fading into the background and appearing too unimportant to register on anyone's dradis.

She was not easily impressed. Good thing, too; these people were easier to spook than the President's usual crowd. There's a crassness, they would say (or, rather, their assistants would), a vulgarity, a _new-money-ness_ to the way in which the merely-famous handle meeting people on the streets. Celebrities, athletes, entrepreneurs, and the like; flashing that easy you-know-who-I-am charm. _These_ people hadn't done something so vulgar as walking on public streets in years. It would be beneath them to be comfortable with impressible youths.

In this tactical environment, you needed a different kind of camo. Far from her own tastes though it was, she had chosen a dress in a grey, expensive fabric, unobtrusive enough that it blended into the background. Finding one with sleeves that covered her arms had been tricky, but the weather was cool enough that no one looked twice. It was cut above the knee, higher than she would prefer, and the neckline plunged lower than she'd like, but each was cut just far enough, she calculated. Far enough to catch eyes but not far enough to turn heads. People, even rich ones, are… _Distractible _that way. The heels were borrowed and chosen to the same ends—open-toe, just in case. They made her feet hurt and she missed her sneakers, but _these_, if pressed, she couldn't deny liking.

Completing the effect were a plain but _very_ expensive necklace and a matching watch, borrowed from someone who owed her a favor. A _lot_ of people owed her favors.

"You look breathtaking," J.G. Kominsky had told her, beaming. His breath was taken away by no woman, but she appreciated the compliment.

Carolyn regarded her physicality as she regarded everything else: As a tool. Her usual beat was the darker arts. Like her boss—not Adar, the President, but Kominsky, his Chief of Staff—she had never been hamstrung by the limitations of moral concerns.

Her worldview was straightforward, though not so simple as Claire Kikuchi would accuse her of, in that gratingly pious voice that Carolyn would never put up with were Kikuchi not in The Family. It boiled down to this: The Federalist Party, we're the heroes. We seek to do good things. Improve the worlds. Move society forward. The Municipalist Party, they're the villains. They seek to hold us back (your mileage of "us" may vary). To delay, discredit, dilute, defeat, and, if at all possible, dismantle _progress_. Accordingly, whatever's necessary in service of the Party is in service of good, and therefore is good. Even things of which you don't speak aloud at cocktail galas.

To her credit, Kikuchi would allow that Carolyn's allegiance to the party was more abstract and principled than that of many of her peers, whose neediness, insularity, and myopic foci on their own special-pleading she found no less revolting than they found her technocratic bent cold. She had grown up in Federalist homes on a Municipalist planet. From the former, she had imbibed a reflexive partisan loyalty, and having grown up hating the right people, she'd acquired from the latter a layer of ideological commitment. That's the _really_ sticky kind allegiance. The kind that won't get dislodged easily.

It was enough to get her through parts of the job that she didn't like. If today the job was to dress up and wear her hair down, that was what the cause needed today. She would do it and smile.

You wouldn't know it to judge from appearances, but most of the staff hated these things every bit as much as the President had grown to. Not _all_ of them, mind you; every few minutes, Ken Adelyne's laughter boomed over the light background music. Tall, slim, wenge-skinned and _frakking annoyingly_ handsome, he was probably the only person in the room who was faking nothing. Carolyn liked the gregarious Communications Director. But she had a more practical reason for sticking near him at these things: If you want to hide your light after sunset, look not for a bushel but for a lighthouse. Adelyne shone very bright. If her sense of humor was bone-dry, his was soaking wet, and it played well at these events.

The good news was, they didn't need a lot of money to retire the debts left over from the previous election, and raising money for the next one wasn't their problem. _If you fancy getting shaken down, the FIC people are here to oblige—but _us_? The Cav House people, the _President's_ people? No, no. All _we_ want is the ongoing fealty of the great and good to President and Party… _

Which the gathered magnates were eager to give. All good people were Federalists anyway.

That the Gala should come only a month after things had gone disastrously wrong on Aerilon wasn't ideal, the editorial page of the _Caprica Tribune_ had said, with just the kind of droll understatement Carolyn would have suggested had she, oh, say, made a phone call to suggest the angle. But between her and Kominsky, Carolyn's own view was different. It underlined the point, didn't it? We made great progress in President Adar's first term, but it's still curing. And the progress thusfar in his second term is fragile. Of _course_ the Municipalists are going to make political hay from Aerilon; of _course_ their Delegates and Representatives will make angry speeches and offer dire predictions about next year's election; all the more reason you need to back us to the hilt. It can all be taken away if you don't line up behind President and party, buddy. So buck up, bucko. And then go talk to the FIC people and _pony_ up.

Bored, she helped herself to a glass of wine from the GUESTS table. Most of the people here had no idea who she was, and cared less; as for those who did… Well, one advantage to being Carolyn D. Culverson, Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff, dispenser of favors and keeper of secrets, was that no one was going to stop her.

As she sipped—and it was good bubbly, she had to admit—she spotted a redhead across the room who was, if anything, somehow thinner and paler than Kikuchi. Carolyn was no expert on such things, but while her dress and hair were immaculate, neither struck Carolyn as reflecting the kind of bank-balance it took to get into this event if you weren't staff. What she _was_, though, was _arrestingly_ beautiful.

Carolyn circled around the room and caught Kikuchi's arm. "Who's that?" She pointed, as subtly as she could.

"Culverson, are you feeling alright? You just showed interest in another human being."

"Har har, frak you. No, seriously: Who is she?"

Kikuchi bobbled her eyebrows. "_That_ is Francesca Innes. She's a lawyer with the party on Canceron."

"One of ours?"

"She might be, if Brenwood relapses," Kikuchi joked.

"You've gotta quit before you can relapse," Carolyn retorted. _She_ was _not_ joking. "Where is he, any—wait. Really? You're looking at her for Counsel?"

"Maybe. She did good work for CRP, so I found a place for her at the FPC Central Office—"

"You took take another protégé? Claire, I'm hurt."

Kikuchi ignored her. "She's done great out there, so I floated the idea of bringing her to Caprica. That's why she's here; the Counsel's office is vacant in the Finance IG. From what she's said tonight, she's open to making a move."

"Oh?" Carolyn's eyebrows went up.

"To _Caprica_. Settle down."

"Did I say anything?" asked Carolyn D. Culversion, Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff. Then, with all the innocence she could muster. "Introduce me."

"If you promise to leave her alone…?" Kikuchi gave her a taut smile and led her over.

"Frances, this is Carolyn. She worked for me on the '88 campaign; now she works for Jerry, who you met earlier."

"Frances Innes." The smile she gave as she shook Carolyn's hand was molten iron.

"Carolyn Culverson. A pleasure," Carolyn said, swallowing.

"Likewise. And what—"

With timing good enough to almost rekindle Carolyn's belief in the gods, Kikuchi's cell phone rang. She shot a wan smile at Innes, a warning one at Carolyn, and stepped away, muttering that she had to take it.

"I'm sorry," Carolyn said; "you were asking…?"

"I was going to ask what you do for Mr Kominsky?"

"Well, Frances, my job's to know where the bodies are buried, and I have a decent sideline selling shovels and maps."

"Oh… okay?" The smile became a little puzzled and a lot more cautious.

"Sorry, I mean—" she silently cursed herself. "It's a joke. I do a lot of running, a lot of practical, executive stuff; I deal with the Quorum, the Congress, the press, that kind of thing, and some of those people are… Well, difficult. It's a high-pressure job. You find yourself making a lot of jokes of what I'm dumb enough to forget are of questionable taste. Sorry, I don't normally come to these kinds of things."

Innes chuckled, and with enormous grace offered a thin joke of her own: "Well, I'm interviewing with Finance, not Justice, and as far as I understand the Ministry's jurisdiction, they don't care so long as you reported sales tax on those shovels and maps."

Carolyn returned the courtesy chuckle. "Claire said you're on Canceron but you may move here."

"It's looking that way! Yes, Ms Kikuchi's been very encouraging. I'd love that, yes. She, uh… I guess she saw something in me when I was working for the Campaign to Reelect the President. She got me the job I'm doing now, and I'm grateful, and of course I'm very happy in Psammos—but, wow, I'd love to take the next step. Help with what we're doing here; be a part of the President's team. I really admire him. What he's done, what you've all done, all he's gone through for us."

She seemed so eager. If only she knew, Carolyn thought; she would be disappointed. They _all_ would be if they saw the Richard Adar that Carolyn, Kominsky, and Adelyne hid from public view.

"Claire's got a good eye for talent. 'Course, I _would_ say that since it's how I got my job," Carolyn found herself confessing. Was she still a little dazzled by Innes? She shook her head, trying to clear the fog; her head would not be turned by some debutante, no matter how beautiful, and her comportment wouldn't be corrupted by one glass of sparkling white.

Another phone went off across the ballroom, and Carolyn recognized Kominsky's ring-tone. She glanced over at Kikuchi, whereupon unwelcome professional instincts clicked back in: Kikuchi was talking into her cell, and making a beeline for her was Kominsky, his cell also pressed to his ear. Carolyn could see neither of their faces, but their stances were stiff enough to trigger alarm bells.

"Frances, it's a pleasure to meet you and I'd like… I hope…"

She opened her mouth again, and closed it again. She didn't _have_ to go check. Just for once in her life, she could let events play out; let Kominsky tag her in if and when necessary. She could stay right here and let herself be dazzled for a while.

But she couldn't. "Look, I'm sorry, but would you excuse me for _just a moment_?"

"For the record," Kominsky was telling Kikuchi, it's 21:15 on February 7th, 1,999 years After the Exodus, and we just learned the news."

"What's happening?" Carolyn asked.

"Henry Brenwood killed himself. They just found the body."

"Frak," Carolyn murmured.

"He dressed for the Gala and I guess changed his mind. Claire, I hate to be a ghoul, but he didn't have a deputy and his plate was full—"

"You think that might be why…?" Kikuchi began asking.

"I _can't_ think about that right now." Kominsky rarely looked anxious, let alone distressed. "I'll be under oath with the Quorum in a week. There's too many balls in the air; I'll mourn Henry later, but I can't have that office empty. The girl you introduced me to earlier; Fran something? You said she might take over the Counsel's office at Finance? Can she step up?"

Kikuchi's eyes widened a little as she affirmed as much, Carolyn noticed. Kikuchi's faith in her protégés was sometimes misplaced, but always complete.

She glanced back over toward Innes. A last look, of sorts. She felt a pang of regret; for a few minutes, it had been nice just meeting someone at a party. But if Innes was going to be the new Henry Brenwood, Cavendish House Counsel, that meant Carolyn would have to be the old Carolyn D. Culverson, Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff.

_I guess_, she thought,_ I'll be seeing you, Frances Innes_.

_Read how things play out with Frances, Carolyn et al in "Evaded Cadence," a free Battlestar Galactica eNovel coming in December 2019. Visit www .TheRacetrackChronicle .com for more information._


End file.
